Dozens gather on Osage Avenue to mark the 40th anniversary of the MOVE bombing
In 1985, 11 members of the Black-led group MOVE were killed when Philadelphia police bombed their home.
The mood at 63rd Street and Osage Avenue in West Philadelphia was a somber one Tuesday, with dozens of people clad in white standing silently in light rain as 11 names were recited to the crowd.
Rhonda Africa. Theresa Africa. Frank Africa. Conrad Africa. John Africa. Tree Africa. Delisha Africa. Netta Africa. Little Phil Africa. Tomaso Africa. Raymond Africa.
Forty years ago, after a 12-hour standoff between police and members of the Black-led, back-to-nature group MOVE, the city of Philadelphia bombed a home, letting the fire spread across two city blocks through dozens of rowhouses. Eleven members of the group were killed. Five were children.
“With the support of the FBI, Philadelphia police were armed and equipped with tear gas, water cannons, and high-grade military weapons that were, at that time, hardly ever found in the hands of city police departments,” said Krystal Strong, who cocurated a MOVE exhibit last year at the Paul Robeson House and Museum.
Strong and other speakers went over in detail how authorities surrounded the rowhouse, creating checkpoints around the block, setting barricades, and flying helicopters overhead. Police would go on to fire more than 10,000 rounds of ammunition in under 90 minutes.
The crowd would shout “shame” as speakers laid out the events of the day.
No city official was ever held criminally liable for the incident, and it was not until 2020 that City Council issued a formal apology, establishing May 13 as an annual day of “observation, reflection and recommitment.”
Though MOVE and its tactics still invoke complicated feelings among Philadelphians, especially former neighbors, the violent response to the group remains a stain in the city’s history and widely condemned.
Korean War veteran Vincent Leaphart founded the back-to-nature group in 1972, taking on the name John Africa; all MOVE members would adopt the surname. In the years that followed, the group became known for its raw-foods diet, extreme love of animals that extended to any random strays, and anti-government, anti-police attitudes.
The group, headquartered in a Powelton Village rowhouse by 1978, had a history of clashing with authorities and drew such ire from neighbors for taunting police through a bullhorn that then-Mayor Frank Rizzo eventually sent bulldozers to tear down the home and evict MOVE. The effort ended in a shootout where one officer was killed and almost 20 people were injured — mostly firefighters and police.
After a 19-week trial, nine MOVE members were sentenced to 30 to 100 years in prison for the death of Officer James Ramp. The convictions would give the group a new focus as they relocated to Osage Avenue, once again becoming the subject of neighborhood complaints.
The city had a new executive by then in W. Wilson Goode, Philadelphia’s first Black mayor, who felt compelled to intervene. Goode would later testify before an investigating commission that while he approved the plan to use a bomb, he did not know it would be dropped by air. Goode has apologized since, admitting that regardless of his understanding of the plan, the bombing and fire took place under his watch.
In the decades since the bombing, surviving MOVE members continued to call for the release of the remaining MOVE Nine from prison — two died in custody — and fought to keep the memories of those killed in the Osage Avenue bombing alive.
Yet the group has remained in the news for a host of reasons. In a 2021 blog and podcast, former MOVE members accused the group of abuse and being a cult. That year, the city revealed it had kept remains belonging to bombing victims in a box at the Philadelphia Medical Examiner’s Office until then-Health Commissioner Thomas Farley ordered them cremated and disposed of in 2017 without telling MOVE members.
What’s more, The Inquirer reported that a University of Pennsylvania anthropologist mishandled the remains of at least one bombing victim, using them in an online anthropology course.
Mike Africa Jr., whose parents were part of the MOVE Nine, said the city showed no care for the bombing victims in the decades since. He and others are trying to start a new chapter in the organization’s history and “reclaim Osage.”
He is raising money to buy the Osage house, which was taken over by the city after the bombing and redeveloped. He said he cannot place any kind of memorial on the property until he fully owns it.
He is trying to raise $400,000 through a GoFundMe. The campaign has already raised more than $22,000.
“We will show the city that we don’t need you,” Africa told the crowd. “We as a community have everything that we need within it, and we’re not asking for the city to do anything, but we’re demanding justice, and we’re going to keep on pushing forward. On the move.”
Then, with instrumentals in the background, the names of the 11 people killed in the bombing were read again.